Zoom Etiquette & The Panopticon; Or What I've Been Up To Lately · 11:26pm Nov 14th, 2020
Heya! I can't believe that it's been since July that I let you guys know how I was doing. I've been very busy since then as in August I got into graduate school, and have been knee deep in work since then. It has been an absolute cluster to be honest, ever since the pandemic delayed my the processing of application to the University for several months, to the point where I was only admitted the week of the start of the semester.
Anyhow, being as it is 2020, all my classes are on Zoom now. Today, whilst reading for one of my classes I struck upon this notion: Zoom is a Panopticon.
Lisa Rofel's Other Modernities: Gendered Yearning in China After Socialism talks about F******t's view of the Panopticon prison as a metaphor for social control. The Panopticon prison was a prison design of the 1790s, one of those trendy "the enlightenment can solve everything" social reform experiment ideas where prisons would be built in a circular shape with individual cells, and in the center of this donut shaped prison there's be a guard tower where you could be under surveillance 24/7 365. The idea was that with the prisoners always surveilled, but in a way where they couldn't see the guards or other prisoners they'd be unable to act out or escape. The idea was put forth by a guy called Jeremy Bentham , who creepily suggested it could be used for non-prison environments like schools and hospitals, as well. F******t's, a French philosopher of the 1970s super popular among academia in spite of being openly a pedophile (hence my censoring his name, because to hell with him), who admittedly had some interesting insight into power dynamics, saw the prison design as a kind metaphor for the surveillance state.
Which brings me to Zoom, and Zoom etiquette. Now, it's long been good form to mute oneself on video calls unless speaking to avoid interrupting the conversation. Zoom didn't invent that, and it's certainly no different than the social expectations of a real life classroom either. But Zoom has brought on another social expectation, one which my professors insist upon. Keeping the camera on at all times. Now, the professors claim this is for the purpose of attendance, and are somewhat lenient about it because of technological limitations of some people. Also, they can't really force you to keep the camera on 100% of the time. But they can complain about it, and they have from time to time. It seems now that, unlike a "real" class where being present was enough, every Zoom is a performance for an overseer, no longer is the class looking at the teacher alone but at each other, you can't just hide in the back of the class anymore. We are all watching, and we are all being watched. It unnerves me, especially when I'm feeling upset or when I'm eating, or just generally to know that I'm being watched by everyone in class. It is not a pleasant or comfortable experience. So sometimes, I turn off the camera. But I feel guilty every time I do, because the worst thing you can do in a society of watchers? Choose not to be seen. I particularly feel for other who have similar, or even worse anxieties over public speaking or being "seen" by others. They are required, frequently, to have their camera especially when speaking. And I can't help but think they must be suffering from Fluttershy levels when they do. Why is choosing not to be seen suddenly a crime?
Because Zoom is a Panopticon. Zoom, thanks to it's brush with power due to the pandemic, has unintentionally created a new kind of surveillance
platform from which teachers exert social control over their students. Crucially, it doesn't even matter if the actually exercise their surveillance powers or not (remember, prisoners in the panopticon cannot see the guards), only that the possibility of surveillance remains. Zoom also isolates us, into our individual video streams, so that like the prisoners we cannot blend into the crowd, our every movement, word, action could be watched and seen by anyone else. Worse still, unlike the true Panopticon, the Zoom student is not just surveyed by their professor but by their fellow students. Yet, like a true Panopticon, we cannot really each out to our fellow students in a positive, real life way: we are in a cell of our own making. So... yeah. Pretty dystopian stuff, fairly on par for 2020. Maybe it's time was ask everyone to turn their cameras off?
Sorry if this was all a bit dark... can you tell I've spent more time in Zoom meetings than is healthy? Anyways, once I make it through finals in a couple weeks I should have more free time as my break is a little longer this year thanks to you know what. I can't promise I'll necessarily end up finishing that Flutterdash fic I promised you all, but hopefully I'll be willing and able to get that out the door. At least the election went OK? I once again worked the polls, pandemic and all, and I thought we did a great job this year. I was posted to a different, smaller precinct this year and I was glad to have coworkers under the age of a 1000 (no offense intended Luna & Celestia) for once. And hey, now hopefully the organ bad man will go away! I plan on squeezing in the winter edition of virtual TrotCon, somewhere between final papers, so I will be there to hang out. In the mean time, stay safe and healthy, and hang in there every pony!
Wow; that sounds ghastly. I'm sorry you to deal with that.
Though, you do have a less difficult coordination problem than the prisoners, at least. I don't know how hard it would still be to coordinate everyone in the class simultaneously turning their cameras off and leaving them off, but at least you could potentially communicate through other channels. Well, more convenient ones than tapping on pipes out of view behind you and hoping the person in the next cell over also knows the code you're using, or something.
"In the mean time, stay safe and healthy, and hang in there every pony!"
Thanks, and good luck yourself!